Industrial climbing with Capital Safety

A little while ago we did a multi-purpose commercial shoot at the Capital Safety training facility in Greenfield near Manchester. What was required were some climbing skills to illustrate work and training scenarios for people working at height - be in on top of wind turbines, comms towers, masts or rooftops. Also, I was asked to produce a set of pictures showing the Capital gear in application. For those not familiar with the subject matter, Capital Safety are worldwirde leaders in fall protection, height safety equipment, fall prevention and fall arrest systems.


The good folks at the Greenfield training site were a dream to work with: professional, easy-going and very accommodating to my arty-farty ideas of how to photograph industrial climbers. Together with my assistant, we made ourselves at home there for three days and produced a rounded set of pictures that reflect their superb capabilities and the site's potential - see my favourites here:

Oliver Samwer in the fast lane

Last week I had a very quick shoot. Oliver Samwer, CEO of the European Founders Fund lives in the fast lane. Together with his brothers Alexander and Marc, the Samwers established the European Founders Fund and are among Europe's most consistently successful entrepreneurs investing in internet start-up companies.


We communicated via SMS, he changed the location twice, and I finally met him at a West London hotel lobby as he was finishing a meeting with a business associate. He had arrived from the US that day and was already on his way back to the airport to fly to Turkey - oh, and there was another meeting somewhere along the way. It was a good call to arrive 15 minutes early, as he was already jumping into a taxi by the time we were supposed to meet. 

The shoot lasted a whole five minutes - a few pictures inside the lobby, then a brisk walk out in front of the hotel, conveniently we stayed close to the taxi rank. I managed literally a 'few more' frames before he had enough, a quick handshake, I turned around and he was gone.

Today one of the portraits appeared across a whole page in the German Spiegel Magazine - some of the others you can also view in the slideshow below.

Visum Fotoschule - my first workshop

I'm excited and it's official: together with my German agents Visum and their Photo-school, we have now launched my first workshop project proposed for this autumn. From 1st to 5th October, I will be leading a 5-day visit to one of my favourite places, the Vysocina region of the Czech Republic. 


Although landscape and travel photography are the focus of this workshop, course participants will have significant influence over the final subject choices. More infos here (in German), but watch this space for an English workshop description.

A short slideshow of what you can expect is below:

Tarnished Earth exhibition opens in Bristol

The Tarnished Earth exhibition schedule has been extended yet again and it will open in Broadmead in Bristol tomorrow. An article annoucing the exhibition appeared here.

The Silk Investor: Zin Bekkali

Last month I had a short but pleasant portrait assignment with a young entrepreneur called Zin Bekkali. He's the CEO and founder of Silk Invest, an upstart city firm investing in the lesser know markets of the former trade routes.

Sympathetic, energetic and a mix of cultures, Zin was easy to photograph and a pleasure to meet. Below are a few selects from the encounter - and I am curious to see which my client at Frankfurter Allgemeine picked.

A Day in Dungeness

Probably most famous for its location housing Britain's first and oldest nuclear power station, Dungeness has also been named as one of the most 'authentic' spots to visit, with the others being Zanzibar, Antigue and Vienna.

Well, I'm not so sure about that, but certain aspects of the large shingle beach littered with rotten boats, dumped containers and fishing gear give it a third world feel. It's not all bad, though. We found plenty of picturesque scenes, and you probably have to take the rough with the smooth.

Dungeness point does feel a bit like the end of the world, with the wide, flat coastal expanse giving it an air of desolation, emptiness and, um, bleakness. See for yourselves here, or go visit - it's about 2 hours away from London.

Ze Zeitgeist in London

Last week I had a pleasant little assignment: portray the sympatico owner of the German gastro-pub Zeitgeist at The Jolly Gardeners in London. Whilst in the middle of refurbishing the kitchen, a friendly Juergen Maennel opened the door and promptly offered me a beer at 11 in the morning. Phew.

Though we were both a bit pressed for time, a pleasant conversation ensued and we got on with taking the pictures - a travel section opener for a major German newspaper was what we were after. When I asked how and why he founded this place, former broker Juergen says that he simply swapped sides at the bar...enough said.

And what a bar it is - majestic German taps, a beer list that would put most pubs to shame and a generous menu featuring Schnitzel, Sausages, Burgers, German 'classics' and some sandwiches (we're in England, after all) suggest that he's got the concept right. The place is unique, but rounded enough so that there's something for everybody.

After the shoot, I was treated to a delicious Cappuchino and a salmon sandwich garnished with edible flowers...I'll be back there for sure!

Playing with fire

Don't worry: I don't have pyromaniac tendencies of any kind, but there is something fascinating about gas flames. Actually, I've been thinking of shooting this for a few years now, just never got 'round to it and putting it off for the same reasons as many other things, photographic and otherwise: not urgent, can do whenever, it's easy, etc etc. I'm sure this sounds familiar.

Well, a small commercial job finally gave me the right impulse to shoot in my own kitchen. Hey, a pleasant side-effect was that I had to clean and polish my kitchen hob - not something I've been looking forward to, I must admit.

Anyway, as the sun set and it got dark, the blue flames came to light. Perhaps I got carried away a little, but it was enjoyable - and I like the results:

Stylish Switzerland

Apart from being ridiculously expensive, uber-correct, efficient and polite, Swiss cities Bern and Zurich are also exceedingly stylish. We're not talking about hyper-modern, designer-only type of stylish, but rather an interesting, subtle blend of old architecture, retro-colours and the odd monument of world-class design by notables such as Le Corbusier. 


Also, the people meandering on the promenade of Lake Zurich or in Bern city centre appear to be straight out of a fashion catalogue, to an extent I find incredible. Like it or lump it, the jury is still out on this one. However, as a photographer, I am fascinated by all this and thus share a small glimpse of my impressions from a recent fly-by visit to this odd island in the centre of Europe.

Minus 29 celsius

Ever been this cold? Me neither, probably. Well, actually, I have, but it's more than 10 years ago whilst on a trip to eastern Slovakia in the middle of winter.


But I digress. This time, I was once again in the Vysocina region of the Czech Republic working on a personal project when the big chill occurred. First signs were pretty fern frost, or window frost patterns on the inside of my windows. Later in the week I discovered that my car had been frozen to an almost solid state - the battery was flat, the door hinges creaked, the clutch seized and the engine oil turned to goo. Ah well, life during a typical Vysocina winter, what can you do?


So instead of driving, I took a long walk across the wintery landscape and enjoyed the views. I hope you do too, without shivering...

London by Leica

As an unexpected by-product of experimenting with the Leica M9, I discovered my affinity for photographing architecture with the rangefinder camera. Although it does not have tilt-shift, and I rarely use a tripod, I find the following vistas striking... it kindof suits me - using a camera for what it was NOT designed for...

The Leica Files II

As part of my 'get to know the M9' efforts, I have chosen to re-shoot the major scenes from my Empty London book project. For starters, I would give me a relatively controlled environment in which to experiment with the camera, and secondly, I'd already know what kind of pictures I want. 


So over the course of a couple of weeks late last year, I ventured into town in regular intervals, armed with the M9 and a couple of prints from my book. To my (perhaps naive) surprise, I'd found that the city had changed. Houses had disappeared, new highrises had risen in places, railings were missing and roads had changed in layout and direction.

Anyway, since this was a reshoot, and I was aiming to show the 'new' pictures as historical records, taken with a Leica and aged with the help of a sepia filter,  they would contrast nicely with those taken for the book with various Canon cameras several years ago. It would also bring the additional benefit of comparison between the quality of Leica and Canon optics used. The results, I think, speak for themselves...now let's hope Leica Magazine agree and decide to publish.

Pasta Swooshing

Hopefully still topical and resonating with silly Christmas and New Years Eve party moods, some of my good friends in Switzerland decided to go retro and re-create a rather funny 1948 photograph from the Bettman/Corbis collection.

So we lined up a large table, cooked pasta, the girls got styled & dressed, and then it was showtime. Well, what can I say? It got messy...

Pheasant Shooting

A few days before Christmas, I ventured a few hours north of London to Belvoir Castle on the invitation of the Duke and Dutchess of Rutland to participate in a day of driven pheasant and partridge shooting. Arguably, it's one of the most luxurious ways in which guns can enjoy a day of shooting, provided they have the necessary pocket money and bookings are available.

Although field sports are not my cup of tea, and I don't shoot anything unless there's a camera involved, the day with the guns, beaters and pickers up was educational and most of all, quite photogenic - so my newspaper client was happy. Only later did I learn that in the UK, over 35 million pheasants and 6.5 million partridges are produced to be used as game birds for sport each year.

The Leica Files I

The good folks at LFI Magazine in Germany have made me an offer I couldn't refuse: the loan of their Leica M9 full-frame digital rangefinder camera plus the use of three of their finest lenses - the 21/2.8 Elmarit-M, the 35/1.4 Summilux-M and the 90/2.0 APO-Summicron-M ASPH. In total it is about 20000 US$ worth of kit which they have entrusted me with.


Whilst I am getting familiar with this camera, the differences to my trusted Canon EOS kit could not be greater: the Leica is manual focus, centre-average metering only, with a simple but slightly cumbersome settings menu on the back, a small buffer for shooting series of images, and a maximum burst rate of 2 frames/second. But it is - if you compare it to watches - like wearing a Rolex after you've grown up with a Casio.


In a single word, the optical quality of the Leica lenses is superior. Period. I don't have the time or the space to go into elaborate comparisons, highlight examples of its image quality in tiny image crops enlarged to 100% or otherwise list the Leica's many fine qualities - there are other places for that (such as DP Review, Luminous Landscape, Ken Rockwell, Digital Journalist and many others.

Instead, I feel compelled to talk a little bit about how this camera feels, how it makes you respond to everyday scenes on the street, and how the images look. Given its classic Leica rangefinder design, the all-metal camera is both lighter and smaller than its SLR cousins. The manual focusing system does not lend itself to point-and-shoot actions, which means you generally have to think more about your focus, exposure and composition before pressing the shutter. In short, it is not a camera for beginners, but it makes you take different pictures (especially if you're used to shooting with SLRs).


I have now completed post-production of the first 100-odd images selected from my various trips into central London, and the results blew me away! Whilst the images are of everyday things in London, their technical quality is outstanding. The optics allow for even sharpness from the centre into the corners, vignetting and distortion is negligible and needs to be added in post-production if desired. Despite their overall sharpness, each of the lenses shows a wonderfully creamy bokeh in the out-of-focus areas that gives photos their signature 'Leica' look.

Colours are fairly neutral, reds need to be subdued a bit, and overall contrast is moderate - that means you can add a punch at the processing stage without wrecking the shadows or highlights. Even at high ISO settings, there is no discernible noise in the images - whatever noise there is, it looks like film grain and adds some grit to those night-time pictures.

I could go on and on, but think it best to add a part II to the Leica Files at a later stage, and let you see some of the images for yourself below:

Tarnished Earth opens in Sheffield

Tarnished Earth exhibition opens at The Moor in Sheffield. More details here.

Fiesta - a documentary by Bjoern Goettlicher

Last week, my friend and fellow photographer Bjoern Goettlicher published his latest documentary project: Fiesta. It's a show-stopping take on a small local celebration involving a bull, a ring and some fire. Although bullfighting has been abolished in Catalonia, this particular community is attempting to have their traditional fiesta recognised by UNESCO.

Anthropologist Alberto de Jesus Rodriguez explains the controversial nature and symbolism of bulls and their role in Iberian culture. Like it or hate it, this fiesta is a firm part of the rural fabric and the story is wonderfully told and shot. 


Subtitles are only in German so far, but an English version is scheduled for release soon.



Fiesta, by Björn Göttlicher from Björn Göttlicher on Vimeo.

Rainbow Warrior III in London

Yesterday afternoon I met her for the first time: I'd seen plenty of pictures, heard some stories, met some of the extraordinary people who had built her and talked to some of those who sail her. We are of course talking about the new Greenpeace flagship, the Rainbow Warrior III.

The ship is currently on its maiden voyage which started in Hamburg to Amsterdam, from where she sailed to London. The next stops will take her to Stockholm, Barcelona and Marseille before she crosses the pond and visits the USA early next year.

To celebrate the occasion, Greenpeace UK organised a concert by Damon Albarn and Clash founder Paul Simonon’s band The Good, The Bad and The Queen which was performed on the heli-deck of the vessel. Needless to say, it was a memorable occasion and I am glad to have been there.

David Shairp interview

I've barely arrived back in London and the phone rings: "Erm, we hope you're in London... you see, this morning there is an interview, and we forgot to book a photographer...

Sound familiar? Well, welcome to my world. So of course you drop whatever you had planned for the day, forget breakfast, actually forget the shower too whilst you're at it. Get your gear, check batteries, take some spares, and off you go. Rush rush rush so that you can wait at the destination.

Once I made it to JP Morgan Asset Management, I was treated to some coffee and a wait for David Shairp whose schedule was running about 20 minutes late all day. Nevermind. Once we all got into the room, I told him to just 'ignore' me, as we were after candid portraits for the article. Mr Shairp seemed somewhat perplexed by my request, but after the initial flashes during set-up, he settled into the interview just fine... The meagre pickings of a half-hour interview you can view below:

Tarnished Earth exhibition opens in Douglas

The Tarnished Earth exhibition opens in Douglas on the Isle of Man. More details here.

There's a nice article that appeared concurrently in the Isle of Man Today newspaper.

Autumn and Vysocina colours

Folks, whilst away in the Czech Republic, I was treated to one of nature's best annual spectacles: its transformation from green to a wide gamut of autumn hues... It lasts only a few days, a week perhaps, and after  the first frosts, the leaves start falling and announce the impeding winter season.

So we took the opportunity to roam through harvested fields and deserted forests and captured only a small glimpse of what the Vysocina region has to offer. I am sure I will be back for more in the not-too-distant future.

Tarnished Earth exhibition moves to Swansea

The Tarnished Earth exhibition moves to Swansea at the National Waterfront Museum. More details here.

The Southampton Boatshow

Last week I was assigned to photograph the Southampton Boatshow. My client briefed me fairly liberally, all I had to do was to produce a cover, with the fold running across the middle of the image. No pressure then...

We spent a day walking around, and apart from covering some specifics that were relevant to the article, I was free to roam around and look for my double-pages. Since this is a busy tradeshow, with thousands of stalls and visitors, I was aiming for a fairly clean, uncluttered look. Would an abstract picture illustrate the event better than a general view from above? Do I need to concentrate on details rather than trying to get it all? I think the answers are self-evident, so enjoy the show!

Designer Kitchen

My friends at Properform Builders asked me for a favour: to shoot a recently finished bespoke designer kitchen they put together for a private client in Islington, London. Since I love design in general, and kitchens in particular, it was an easy choice. Whilst I do not regularly shoot stylish interiors for glossy magazines, this was a nice opportunity to experiment with light, angles and lenses.

Stunning I'd call the kitchen ;-)

Blokes in Uniform II

Ok folks, last time it was real uniforms in Eastern Europe, now it's time for some sci-fi fantasy in Scotland. My esteemed colleagues at Greenpeace have been at it again: this time, dressed as Stormtroopers they paid a visit to a VW dealership in Glasgow. They are aiming to nudge the giant car company towards abandoning their lobbying efforts against climate legislation. Their campaign "Volkswagen - The Dark Side" is a humorous twist on the original successful VW ad invoking 'The Force'.

Well, visually, you really can't go much wrong with this kind of outfit...

Blokes in Uniform

I happened to be in the village of Nedvezi in the central part of the Czech Republic when the local volunteer fire crews were having an unprecedented bash: the were commemorating the 120th year of their founding with parades, marching and inevitably, lots of beer.

Having never had an event like this before, tension, apprehension and excitement were predictably high in the small village - they had been planning this for a good year or so: would all go to plan, would the weather co-operate, how many people would come?

In the end, it rained, but it didn't matter - the uniforms were out, the guys were proud, beer was flowing freely and a good time was had by all. Some highlights here:

Canada Tarsands reportage projection at Visa Pour L'Image

Last week saw a new highlight in the marathon publicity-campaign against the tarsands industry. At the world renowned Visa Pour L'Image photofestival, my reportage was shown during a nightly projection at Campo Santo.

Need I say it? The recognition for this story is tremendous, especially since the edit did not show the rather typical 'up close and personal' view of victims of various natural and man-made disasters. Instead, the editors focused on the large-scale aerial images, those that convey a sense of the dimensions and magnitude of destruction that is happening in northern Alberta. The viewer was left to imagine what this means for people on the ground, rather than being spoon-fed the 'classic' photojournalism genre. Bravo and many thanks to the organisers at Visa - I am honoured and grateful.

My friend and colleague Bjoern Goettlicher was kind enough to record the screening, and it is reposted here with his permission.


Jiri Rezac Slideshow at Visa from Björn Göttlicher on Vimeo.

Tarnished Earth Exhibition moves to Edinburgh

The Tarnished Earth exhibition with my photos from the Canadian tarsands will be on public view in Edinburgh from September 1st. More details here.

Busy with Poppies

No folks, this isn't Afghanistan. And no, I was in no mortal danger when taking pictures of these poppies - and neither was I under the influence of any illicit substances in general, and opium in particular. We simply happened to drive past them in the Czech countryside during the summer holidays. Although I knew of poppy being grown here, I had no idea that the Czech Republic is the world leader in poppy seed production, with around 50000 tons, or over 50% of global output.

Thus these fields are pretty common, unguarded and frankly, quite unspectacular once the red petals finish blooming. Nevertheless, I had my trusty G10 with me, and couldn't resist taking a few images.

Canada Tarsands reportage to be shown at Visa Pour L'Image in Perpignan

after having just returned to London, I have learned that on Tuesday, the 30th August, my reportage of Canada's Tarsands will be shown during an evening projection at Visa Pour L'Image photojournalism festival in Perpignan, France. Thanks to my French agents Rea who submitted the images, I am surprised and  immensely humbled at the recognition this story continues to receive. A small preview of the main images, as featured in the travelling  Tarnished Earth open-air exhibition are displayed below.